Nikalas Marani Budeshuri 2022

Cellar for up to 15 years. Decant for up to an hour before serving.

Nikalas Marani is one of the finest small-scale wineries in Georgia, located in the village of Kardenakhi, on the right bank of the Alazani River. It was restored in 2005 by Zurab Mgvdliashvili, but the original building dates all the way back to 1928, when it was founded by Nikala, Zurab’s grandfather. Today, Zurab crafts a beautiful range of organic wine from native Georgian grapes, including Budeshuri, an offshoot of Saperavi, used to make this bold, jammy red wine.

Rich scents of ripe strawberry, plum jam, spice and liquorice greet you from the very beginning. The grapes were fermented using an ancient method known as qvevri, where they are buried under the earth in large clay vessels. This imparts a rustic, tannic quality to the wine, but in this case, it manages to keep a wonderfully silky mouthfeel. It is subtly sweet, and incredibly easy to drink.

Look for flavours of jammy dark fruits, sweet cherry, strawberry and spice. There are savoury undercurrents of liquorice, smoke, and a long, earthy aftertaste. The fruits were harvested from vines growing on limestone soils, in Georgia’s chief wine region of Kakheti. It is a perfect wine for sharing and enjoying alongside lamb dishes, hard cheese, or mushrooms.